Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 29.djvu/333

Rh what foreign laborers will do cheaper; and, moreover, the raising of silk has always been carried on by the poorest and most inefficient peoples, who, as they rise in the social scale, abandon it, as is now coming to be the case in Southern France—France being unable to compete with the cheap labor of China and Japan. It may be added that another reason for the decline of silk-culture in France is said to be due to climatic changes.

One spring my attention was called to an article on silk-culture in which it was stated that silk could be successfully and profitably raised in the United States. The article then went on to quote from a manual written by a young girl, who had tried silk-raising and had been very successful. By a strange coincidence, in a few days a friend offered me an ounce of silk-worm eggs which she had just received from the Department of Agriculture at Washington. Not having the time, and possibly the inclination, to raise the worms herself, she kindly gave them to me, and I determined to try the experiment of raising silk-worms in one of the New England States.

During three or four months of cold weather the eggs were kept in a cool place in a cellar, at as even a temperature as was practicable, the thermometer rarely, if ever, going below freezing-point, and never rising above forty degrees.

The mulberry-tree, upon which the worm feeds, is one of the last trees to leave out in the spring; but soon after the 1st of June the leaves began to show themselves, and on the 11th of June the eggs were placed in a warm room, where, on the 13th, they had begun to hatch. Only a few worms appeared that day; the two following days there were more, and on the 16th and 17th great numbers appeared. It is estimated that there are forty thousand eggs in an ounce, but only between two and three thousand of my lot hatched. However, a number of the eggs had been given away, and probably some were unfertilized, or had been killed.

Then began the task of keeping the worms supplied with food; and, fortunately, I had found a friend willing to undertake the experiment with me, for a task it indeed proved. The white mulberry is not common in Salem, and the nearest tree was nearly one quarter of a mile from the house, and often we went a greater distance for the leaves. At first a small number of leaves were sufficient, but in a week or two my friend and myself had all we could do to keep the worms, which were growing rapidly, supplied with fresh leaves; then, too, the lower branches of the tree, which was a large one, were soon stripped, and some one had to climb the tree for us. Fresh leaves had to be picked every day, sometimes twice and even three times a day. This in itself took some time, and, if the leaves were at all damp, they had to be wiped or dried in some way before filling the trays.

The trays in which the worms were kept had to be very carefully cleaned, and all the refuse removed every day. As the worms grew